The Nile River flows through or beside Khartoum, Aswan, and Cairo.
The river is formed by two major tributaries: the White Nile, which rises in the Lake Victoria region, and the Blue Nile, which begins at Lake Tana in Ethiopia. They meet at Khartoum in Sudan, after which the unified river travels north through Egypt toward the Mediterranean Sea.
The Nile has supported settled agriculture and urban civilization for thousands of years. Ancient Egyptian communities depended on its water and fertile floodplain, while later dams helped regulate flow and generate electricity. The Aswan High Dam, completed in the 1960s, created Lake Nasser and greatly reduced seasonal flooding.
The river’s exact ranking by length has sometimes been debated because measurements depend on which headwater is treated as its source. Regardless of measurement method, the Nile is one of the world’s great rivers and remains central to northeastern Africa.